This research examines digital gender advocacy campaigns in India during the 2010s. By employing thematic analysis and conceptual tools of the social representations theory into the analysis of 250 gender advocacy videos published on YouTube, we answer the following questions: a) How are dangers to women in India discussed in recent video campaigns? b) How is the topic objectified and anchored in multimodal narration? c) How is hegemonic womanhood constructed in the campaigns? The findings suggest that campaigns present two social representations of dangers with sexual harassment depicted as a danger for urban middle-class women and the issues of early marriage, lack of female education, and gender-biased sex selection as rural dangers. The primary solution suggested by the campaigns is to encourage women to actively claim their place in society, placing the main responsibility for changing the situation on women themselves. The secondary solution suggested is to encourage families to support girls and women. Thus, the analysis shows how social representations created by gender advocacy in India put responsibility on individuals and excuse social institutions from addressing inequality, while maintaining power relations and class disparities.
Social representations theory (SRT) is considered a theory of social change, accounting for democratic transformations in knowledge. However, its applicability in the Global South, where there is a long history of subjugation, has not been sufficiently explored. This essay integrates the contributions of postcolonial theorists with the tools of SRT to track changes in knowledge structures among Southern youth. In doing so, it shows the limits imposed by an enduring colonial legacy and modern cultural imperialism on Southern youths’ ability to challenge hegemonic representations on their own terms. This is further illustrated by a case study on youth perspectives on homosexuality in India which utilizes data from interviews conducted in Bengaluru with three generations of middle-class families representing India’s three major religions. While the youth accepted homosexuality, elders displayed their resistance. Yet tolerance was perceived as a Western import, revealing an East-West divide in understandings of homosexuality.
Despite considerable evidence of the patriarchal nature of the police and underreporting of gender‐based violence in India, there is a dearth of literature on how gender advocacy campaigns in India tackle these issues. This study addresses this gap by exploring how the police is represented in gender advocacy in India. The material comprises of eight campaign videos from two ideologically opposing organizations: Amnesty International, an international human rights organization and Ministry for Women and Child Development, a government body. Social representations theory and narrative analysis are applied in the analysis to answer how the role of the police is narratively constructed. Results suggest two contrasting representations held by each organization in line with their organizational identities. While Amnesty constructed the police as villains obstructing women's access to justice, the Ministry represented the police as heroes defending women's safety. The analysis contributes a novel way of locating anchors and objectifications by a focus on narrative actions and goals. Additionally, the discussion of the findings broadens conceptions of hegemonic and polemic representations, arguing for a more power‐centric approach that conceives of hegemony in terms of access to media channels and material resources. Please refer to the Supplementary Material section to find this article's Community and Social Impact Statement.
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